We're Amos and Sam, co-founders of Carve. (https://www.drivecarve.com)
Carve is a car sharing marketplace where you can rent cars from local dealerships. So if you don’t own a car but need one for a few days, you can get a car that fits your needs at a reasonable price.
We built this product because when we moved to New York after college, we both gave up cars, and even though most places we needed to be were easily accessible via Subway or Lyft, there were still lots of things we wanted to do that we couldn't using public transit or ride share apps. When it came to leaving the city to ski in Vermont or hike upstate, for example, the existing options were all either expensive (Zipcar, Car2Go), inconvenient (Avis, Hertz), or inconsistent (Turo, Getaround).
Sam and I are both from the Midwest, so neither of us are strangers to car dealerships—drive ten miles in any direction from our childhood homes and you'll see massive lots filled with cars waiting to be sold. We started speaking with these businesses and realized that keeping all those cars sitting around is really, really expensive. Compounding this problem is the fact that new cars sales are falling and dealership inventory levels are historically high.
In response to the issues that dealerships face and the slate of bad rental options, we built a platform on which dealers can list their cars to be rented. It's good for dealers because they can offset financing costs and depreciation of idle inventory without much effort. For renters, it means a short-term rental option that’s on average 30% cheaper any other comparable option, offers a wider selection of cars, and allows for human-free pickup and drop off.
It works as follows. First, browse our site for a car. Once you make a reservation, we'll email you an Uber voucher for $20 off your trip to and from the vehicle pickup location (a 24-hour valet lot in the city). When you arrive at the pickup location, show the attendant your reservation email and they'll fetch you your car. Once you’re done with the car, drive back to lot and hand the keys to the attendant. Use the Uber voucher to call a car to bring you back home.
At the moment, we're only operating in San Francisco, but we'll be expanding soon to Oakland and LA. If you're in SF, try us out and use the promo code HN10 to get 10% off of any rental!
We’d love to get some feedback and are happy to answer questions!
by Andrey
Azimov